All posts by SeattleMoneyCoach

How to take time off and not be stressed out financially

Practical Money Path

It’s hot out here in Seattle! I don’t feel like working, but I’m making myself do some writing and prep for my clients this week. I’m really looking forward to taking off the second half of August.

Wait! Did I just say I’m taking TWO WEEKS off next month? How is that possible? How will I survive financially? I’m self-employed, for crying out loud. The bills still need to be paid in my business, and I still need to take my same paycheck. And as a single mother, I don’t have other income sources to support me when I take time off. So what is my secret?

Let me tell you about a conversation I had years ago with my friend and colleague Joan Casey—an awesome psychotherapist who teaches you how to find and hold onto your boundaries. One day after we had become friends she started talking about going off to India for the entire month of August. She was really looking forward to her trip. I had gotten to know her well enough to realize she was fully self-employed and lived on what she earned. I asked her if this was the trip of a lifetime. “No, not really. I take every August off—the whole month”.

I looked at her dumbfounded. “How?!”

“Oh, I just have my August fund.” She replied. She explained to me that she simply had a dedicated savings account that she called her “August fund” and she transferred money into it regulary. This was how she funded her time off.

It seems so simple. Why had I not seen it? So I decided to set up my own “August fund”. I set up a dedicated savings account linked to my business checking account. I calculated the amount I would need to fund my business in August, including the amount I would pay myself. Then I cut it in half and decided to try to take half of August off. I took this amount and divided it by eleven. (Eleven months not including August.) I went into my business budget and created a new line item expense called “August Fund” and put down the monthly savings amount. In September, I started funding it.

The following August, I took off almost two weeks. It was beautiful. That was six years ago.

For me, it makes sense for several other reasons. August was always a difficult business month. Many of my clients were on their own vacations, and I noticed that my cancellations were higher than normal. My income was always down anyways, and I was frustrated on top of it. I was trying to work while everyone else seemed like they were playing.

Now that I take off half the month, I stack my clients into the first half of August. It’s a busy time for me. The first week of September is heavier than normal too. I’m happy for both of these. Everyone knows I’m out the last two weeks of August, so we all plan according.

Beautiful, isn’t it? I wish I could say I’m going somewhere this August. But since I just bought a house, I think I’ll stay put and unpack. Maybe I’ll even decorate. I’ll watch a lot of movies and take my son to the beach. Maybe every day.

September is coming. Can you set up a dedicated savings account and transfer some money into it in September? Even a small amount will feel great. You can do it! You deserve it.

What to say when people ask “What do you charge?”

Practical Money Path

Many service providers are uncomfortable with this question and they mumble their fees, hoping the prospective client will hire them. Guess what? You shouldn’t answer that question! First of all, you don’t know if this person is a good fit for you. So why would you launch into talking about your fees if they aren’t even in the right place?

But here is a better reason to not answer their question right away. By answering the question, “What do you charge”, it robs you of the chance to educate them about the value you provide. And it’s hard to talk about your value if you don’t even know what they need or want from you!

Instead, when someone asks about your fees, respond with,

“Can you tell me a little about what you would like done?”
or
“Can you tell me a little bit about the issues you would like to work on?”

The first question could work well for a copywriter or web developer. Let the person tell you about their project so you can target your response to their needs. And are you the right person for them? The second question could work well for a therapist. They may bring up an issue that you don’t really work on, so before you waste too much time, you could make a great referral.

Either way, with a little bit of information, you will have a much more productive conversation. I always start this way, listen to them for a while, and then tell them about how I could help them (if I think I can). I explain the benefits of working with me and how I work, focusing on their issue and the results we would work toward.

Here is another thought. Fabienne Fredrickson, the” Client Attraction Mentor”, wrote about this very issue on her blog recently. She writes, and I agree, that if people are overly focused on price in that moment, there isn’t any room for a discussion on value. So she advocates setting up a different time to discuss with them what might work for them. For example, when she gives a talk and people come up to her and say, “Hey I’d like to work with you. What do you charge?” here is what she advises:

The solution? Don’t give them your rates on the spot. Instead, invite them for a conversation to be held at a later date where you can fully describe the value they’ll be getting from working with you. I call mine the “get-acquainted session,” you may call yours a free-consultation, whatever. The important thing is that’s where the magic happens. That’s where you can find out more about them, get to the root of their problems, describe solutions, and they sell themselves into your services, based on value.

Fabienne has many different programs that potential clients could choose from. Some programs are more expensive than others. So by setting up a date to talk with them at a later time, she can help them pick the right program for them. Go to her blog for more thoughts from her. She also gives you her exact words she uses when people ask her “the” question.

I’ve used the same techniques and this works very well. I want to help a prospective client find the right fit for them, whether it is private money coaching with me or as a member of a prosperity group. And sometimes I steer them to a different service provider. When you have a prospect’s best interests at heart, and you are in integrity, it’s always a win-win.

TIME TO EARN MORE?

If you would like to earn what you’re truly worth and step into greater abundance, please see Mikelann’s Unlock Your Earning Power toolkit.   Identify what has been holding you back, learn the skills to ask for more and start earning at your true potential. For both self-employed and salaried women.

 

Join me July 14th for a live seminar in Seattle

Underearning 101

Ready to experience me live? On July 14th, I’m presenting an evening seminar in Seattle for women who are ready to step into prosperity.  I will address how to stop underselling yourself and earn what you’re really worth.  Here is some of what I’ll cover:

  • Identify the five hidden forms of underearning (and how they may be costing you money!)
  • Explore the concept of “noble poverty”—is it holding you back?
  • The impact of the “money fog” on our earning ability
  •  How women under price themselves and what to do about it
  • Two powerful negotiation strategies that conquer the “good girl syndrome” and bring you more money

Click here for more info and to register. If you are near Seattle, I would love to meet you in person!

The Threefold Path to Prosperity Explored

Underearning 101

I believe that in order to step into true abundance, you have to journey down the “threefold path to prosperity”. Below I write about these paths in more detail, with questions for you to ponder. In future blog posts, I will take each path deeper and deeper. Consider this the “threefold path overview”.

Emotional Money Path

The first path, emotional money, takes a deep look at why we do what we do with money. Many of us have deep seated beliefs about money—many of which are unconscious. We may secretly fear that to desire more money is greedy and we may mistrust wealthy people. This unvoiced “noble poverty” wreaks havoc on our ability to earn money.

How do you feel about the wealthy?

Some women feel great about money but secretly hope that somehow they will be “rescued” from the fate of having to earn it all themselves. Feelings of shame and undeservedness arise. These are all very common feelings, wrapped up in our childhoods and societies often confusing messages about money and work.

Do you hope something will rescue you so you don’t have to do this all alone?

Other women may feel less conflicted about money but have a hard time tapping into their personal drive and ambition, and feel ambivalent about money. The path of emotional money is where you dive into your feelings, give voice to your fears and name your beliefs. While these beliefs may no longer serve you, until they are brought to light, they will drive your behavior around money.

Practical Money Path

The second path is the practical money path. This is the path where you learn the skills around asking for more money, from how to set and raise your fees to how to comfortably negotiate for all your needs.

How do you feel about the money you charge? Do you need to charge your clients more money?

However, to come to the place of asking for more, it is helpful to vanquish the money fog that so many people live inside of. The money fog keeps us confused as to how much our lives really cost.

Do you know where your money goes and how much your business is costing you to run?

The practical money path also helps us figure out exactly how much money we need to earn to live a truly abundant life—a life that encompasses not only our needs and our desires but also security and freedom in the future as well as the ability to give money away.

Do you know how much money you need and want to make?

The Metaphysical Path

The final path, metaphysical money, is where you learn to consciously train your thoughts and change your feelings around money, to bring about the results you desire. There are many techniques to learn. This is the most advanced path and requires work on the other paths to be truly effective at this level.

For example, you must be aware of what you believe and be able to name your feelings before you can shift them (emotional money path) and you must know exactly what you desire (practical money) before you can focus on the result you want.

Do you know what it is you want to affirm for your life? Do you have an “abundance practice” that feeds your soul?

While a lot has been written about various “surface” aspects of the metaphysics of money, such as affirmations, this is a very deep path and goes straight to the heart of true prosperity and abundance. Some people meld this final path into their spiritual path.

Stay Tuned

I realize this can sound like a lot, but the truth is that our relationship to money is a complex relationship. This blog is devoted to these three paths, so you’ll see many posts that address how to embrace each path. It is different for everyone. I think we all naturally gravitate towards one path, which is great. But the question is, what do you need to work on that doesn’t feel “natural” to you? Read over the paths again. Can you embrace a part of each one?

What Do Your Fees Say? The Tale of Hiring a Therapist

Practical Money Path

I always tell my audiences that their fees say things about them. Many people hope their rate says they are a “good deal”. But is this what you want it to say? Is it making you look second-rate?

Remember that pricing is about perceived value. We all assume that an expensive bottle of wine is better than a cheaper bottle. Of course this may not be true (I have my favorite Trader Joes bottle!), but price does convey a message to us.

I thought about this when a friend recently told me about her quest to find a good therapist.

My friend decided she wanted to do some therapy on a particular issue, and set about finding a good therapist. She was committed to doing the work, and really wanted a good therapist who specialized in a particular area.

After talking with about four therapists over a week, she grew frustrated finding the right one. Rate-wise, she discovered that they charged in the $105 to $145 range. She heard about a potential therapist from her doctor, and called her. This therapist seemed like a great counselor, and my friend began to wonder if this was the woman. She actually had experience with my friend’s issue!

When my friend asked, “What are your rates?” The therapist paused for a while, and then said “$80 an hour. And of course I have a sliding scale,” She offered hurriedly. My friend thanked her and hung up. She didn’t call the therapist back.

When I asked her why, she said it seemed like the therapist must be brand new, or wasn’t confident in her skills, or had few clients and was trying to attract new ones. None of this appealed to my friend, who really wanted help.

I was frustrated because my friend did need help. Personally, I wish she had hired this therpist. And I can’t help but think that the therapist’s own money issues got in her way. (My guess is that she is working herself to death for very little money or having a hard time attracting clients.)

The real question is– what about you? What do your rates say? Remember, not everyone should be able to afford you. If everyone can afford you, you’re not charging enough money. You do want to attract the right type of clients. (And clients who are very fee sensitive can be very difficult to work with. It takes a lot to make them happy.)

So what do your fees tell people? Do they convey confidence?

The New Face of Underearning—Is It You?

Underearning 101

Years ago, when I first encountered the term “underearning”, I used the definition of “earning less than you need”. While this is accurate (the pattern of earning less than you need is indeed underearning) it does not describe many women out there. This narrow definition seems to say that only women who “struggle” or are just getting by, fall into this frustrating pattern. But is it okay to go from surviving to thriving?!

I know countless savvy women who don’t see themselves as “strugglers” but they don’t see themselves as financially abundant either. They make decent money, as relative as that is. And they are really frustrated. Why? Because they know in their minds and their hearts that they could make more. They know, at some level, that they are earning less than their true potential.

Sometimes this is brought home to them by seeing men who do similar work to them, asking for and receiving far more. Sometimes they have female colleagues who just always seem to make more— money appears to flow easier for them. Oftentimes it is a gut feeling—these women know that the work they do is simply worth more. They get amazing results for their clients. But these results simply don’t translate into more money.

“Underearning” is simply the pattern of earning less than YOUR potential. It is about the pattern of chronically, but often silently, underselling yourself. (Many women do not consistently ask for the money that they truly deserve. This is the most obvious facet of underearning.)

Underearning knows no professional boundaries. It affects consultants, doctors, therapists and countless women who run their own businesses. Sometime when women are in professions that others think of as lucrative, such as the legal profession, they don’t see themselves as “underearners” because they know others don’t see them that way. But this just increases the sense of isolation and frustration!  Just because you “should” be making a lot of money doesn’t mean you do! I know plenty of lawyers who work really, really hard and still don’t make enough to live the life they long to live. They offer a very valuable service and still many of them indeed earn below their potential.

This is truly a silent epidemic —countless amazing women earn far below their potential, and very few people call this what it is: underearning. Tons of experienced women are frustrated that their hard work is not yielding more money. These are women who are very good at what they do, but this work and skill does not necessarily bring them the level of financial abundance that they desire and deserve.

What about you?

Take a moment and look back over your career—look back over the last ten, twenty, thirty years… Do you see a pattern? Do you see a pattern of repeatedly earning below YOUR potential, or less than you could have earned?  If there is a pattern, as opposed to a one time occurrence, than it is time to look deeper. It’s not about surviving. It’s about thriving.

Affirmative Prayer for Unexpected Blessings and Prosperity

Metaphysical Money Path

Recently I spent five days in Alabama with Edwene Gaines, the author of the Four Spiritual Laws of Prosperity. Edwene focuses on helping people change their abundance consciousness – and their money mindset. She is also a Unity Minister. Here is her affirmative prayer for unexpected blessings. I vote we all open up to receiving expected and unexpected prosperity now! Read this, feel this and enjoy this.

Affirmative Prayer for Unexpected Blessings
I live in the midst of infinite abundance.
The abundance of Spirit is my infinite source.
The river of Life’s good never stops flowing.
It flows through me into lavish expression.
Good comes to me through unexpected avenues.
Spirit works in a multitude of ways to bless me.
I now open my heart and mind to receive my good.
With Spirit as my source, nothing is too good to be true.
Wonderful things happen to me, in me, and around me.
I give freely and fearlessly into life and life gives back to me with fabulous increase.
Blessings come from every direction in expected and unexpected ways.
Spirit provides for me in a generous and wonderful manner.
I am filled with joy, peace, and gratitude.
Thank you, Loving Spirit!

Want more help transforming your relationship to money? Check out all the eBooks, audios, and more robust products Mikelann has created. Are you ready to break free of the “money fog” and step into earning what you are worth? Are you are ready to get in touch with your emotions so you never feel out of control around money again? Are you ready to love your financial life? Let Mikelann help you get there. Free items are at the top of the page.

Want More Abundance? Deepen Your Relationship to Money

Emotional Money Path

Are willing to expand how you look at money? Are you willing to deepen your relationship to money?

A lot of women are in pain around money, and I want to change this. One reason they are in pain is because they don’t earn enough, despite how good they are in their work. “Underearning” is about the pattern of earning below your potential. And while this is relative, I know far too many amazing women who underearn.

I believe that what fuels underearning is a fractured approach to money—an approach that doesn’t nurture your relationship to money. Perhaps you look at the mechanics of finance, trying to figure out how to earn more, debt less and save more. Or you look at your money beliefs and try to figure out why you do what you do, fighting your discomfort or ambivalence about money. Maybe you practice an affirmation for a while. But this fractured approach doesn’t honor your overall relationship to money. And maybe this is part of the problem. Do you want this relationship? Or does your relationship to money feel like an “arranged marriage” and now you just have to make do?

It may sound overwhelming, but in my years as a money coach, I’ve found that when women embrace a more holistic relationship to money, and decide to actively nurture this “relationship” on many levels, making money becomes easier and easier.

So I want to invite you to look at ALL three aspects of your relationship to money. It’s time to attend to your emotions and core beliefs around money (emotional money), AND learn skills around asking for and managing money (practical money), AND master the metaphysics of money– how what you think and feel affects your financial life. In short, it’s time for a well rounded holistic approach to this vital relationship, so you can earn what you are really worth. This is the way out of financial pain and into abundance. And this is the path to a more authentic relationship to money.

If you maintain a narrow view of money, looking at only slices of how you relate to finance, your relationship to money stays painful at worst and inconsistent at best. You may earn more for a while and then find yourself slipping backwards—engaging in financial self-sabotage or simply not able to sustain the level you desire. And if you persist in being compartmentalized about money, you will forever keep true abundance at arm’s length!

We are complex beings who are both emotional and intellectual. For too long we have viewed money as either a neutral tool at our disposal or the embodiment of our personal energy. This goes back to the very mind-body split that so many now rail against! Let’s heal this split around money. Let’s look at finance in a way that honors all the facets of who we are.

The good news is that it is possible to have a fabulous relationship to money—a relationship that nurtures you and supports you earning what you’re really worth. As we pay more attention to our emotions around money, learn useful skills around asking for and managing money with ease, and master the metaphysics of money, we step more and more into our true potential. We become more alive. We release limitations and step into our power.

So the question is—are you willing to expand how you look at money? Are you willing to enter into a deeper relationship? If you find the mechanics of money easy, are you willing to look at the emotional aspects? Or if you are at ease in the emotional realm, are you willing to learn some new skills? The first step to earning your worth is to be willing to look at your relationship to money, in all its facets.

Join me as I journey with you down all three of these paths. Please consider earning your worth as a true journey of self-discovery. Healing and transforming your relationship to money is one of the most intense personal growth journeys you can make.

Instead of discounting, try this to feel good about your full fee

Emotional Money Path, Practical Money Path

Are you afraid that people who need you can’t afford you? And is this one reason why you discount your fees at times?

I was talking about the topic of my new workbook  Emotional Pricing~ How to Feel Great Charging What You’re Really Worth, and a colleague said to me, “I don’t know about all of that. I don’t feel right charging a ton of money—what about people who truly need help but can’t afford a lot?”

First of all, isn’t it interesting that she immediately assumed that charging what you’re really worth is a “ton of money”. Hmmm. You can bet that it will be hard for her to charge enough money because she assumes that it is just too much!

But here is the real issue: the fear that people who need you can’t afford you. So let me be clear about something: If you want to make more money, you need to work with a target audience who can afford to pay what you need. There simply isn’t any other way to say it, or do it.

I am very passionate about my work and I want to help the world as well, so I make sure I charge my full fee and make great money. Otherwise, I have no time and I feel resentful. (If people are not paying you enough money, it takes a lot of clients to pay the bills….) If I didn’t make enough money, I would eventually have to close my business and take a full-time position somewhere. And before I got to that point, I would experience a lot of deprivation and frustration with how little money I was earning. I doubt I would be in the best frame of mind to really do my best work. Being under financial stress is incredibly draining.

So I charge my full fee. Then, to “give back,” I do a certain amount of pro bono work that I feel really helps the world. I donate some of my time to causes I feel strongly about.

Years ago I heard the “Rule of the Three Fs.” Do your work for your full fee, do it for free, or flee. The point of the Rule of the Three Fs? Don’t discount! So, one way to feel like you are giving back is to do just that: give back. Charge your full fee and decide to donate a certain percentage of your time to a cause that could benefit from your work. It is a much cleaner way of doing business.

Doing a certain amount of pro bono work on the side can be very satisfying. Many powerful business women become strong pillars in their respective communities because they give back some of their time to causes and charities that are personally important to them. For example, I will occasionally do free seminars for organizations in my area that service disadvantaged women. Some of these women are domestic abuse survivors, or have lived their entire lives far below the poverty line. I care about these women, and know full well they can’t afford my fee, so I will do seminars a couple of times a year on how to ask for a raise, how to negotiate or how to raise your fees. I will talk with them about the pattern of underearning and discuss ways to stop underselling themselves.

These women are not my “target market” – they simply can’t afford me. But rather than discount myself or offer a sliding scale, I’ve found other ways to “give back.”

So stop with all the bartering, sliding scales and discounts. Charge your full fee. (Your “full fee” may still not be high enough. You may need to raise yours fees. But that is a different subject.) You’ll make more money with fewer clients if they pay you enough. Then use some of your time to truly give back to the world.

TIME TO EARN MORE?

If you would like to earn what you’re truly worth and step into greater abundance, please see Mikelann’s Unlock Your Earning Power toolkit.   Identify what has been holding you back, learn the skills to ask for more and start earning at your true potential. For both self-employed and salaried women.